Kavanagh, Matthew

Disciplines

Comparative Politics
Human Rights Law
International Public Health

Position

Fellow, Center for Public Health Initiatives

Introduction

Matthew M. Kavanagh works at the intersection of global health, human rights, and political economy. He is a Mumford Doctoral Fellow in Politics at the University of Pennsylvania and a fellow at Penn's Center for Public Health Initiatives as well as a senior policy analyst for Health Global Access Project. Matthew’s work centers around health in global South countries and explores how human rights regimes affect health outcomes and the balancing of health and public goods provision with economic/trade policy. He serves as a member of the UNAIDS Treatment Advisory Group and has advised the WHO, State Department, and various NGOs on human rights and global health policy. Matthew spent a decade leading transnational policy campaigns in the U.S. and working in Southern Africa, focused on access to HIV treatment, international trade, financial industry regulation, and water rights. During that time he drafted legislation that was introduced in the U.S. House of Representatives; presented before the U.N. Special Rapporteur for the Right to Health, members of the House Ways and Means Committee, and the U.S. Trade Representative; and led a successful campaign to secure HIV treatment for over two million people. Matthew’s writing has appeared in Foreign Policy in Focus, The Lancet Global Health, Health Affairs, JAIDS, the Yale Journal of Law and Feminism, The Huffington Post, and other venues and he has been interviewed in outlets ranging from the New York Times and Wall Street Journal to the BBC and Al Jazeera. Matthew received his BA from Vassar College and masters degree from Harvard University.

Research Interests

Comparative Politics
Health politics & policy
Human Rights
Intellectual Property & Health
International & Comparative Constitutional Law
Political Economy of Development

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